Sports
Hockey

This Facebook photo posted by a paralysis foundation shows a hockey rink painted with an orange warning line around the boards in an effort to make players aware of the boards and keep their heads up to reduce injury. (Facebook/The Thomas E. Smith Foundation)

Calgary researchers say a warning line intended to prevent injury when hockey players are pushed into the boards actually has the opposite effect.

The orange metre-wide line painted on the ice along the base of the boards — known as a look-up line — was created by a U.S. junior hockey player who wanted to remind players to look up before body-checking into the boards.

The study points to medical evidence showing that if hockey players have their head down when they are pushed into the boards, they are at greater risk for head, neck and spinal injuries.

Researchers in the faculty of kinesiology spent a year testing the warning line in the Olympic Oval ice-hockey rink with the help of coaches and players from the men’s varsity hockey team at the university.